Determining image-based product from digital image collection

Abstract

A method of making an image-based product includes providing an image collection having a plurality of digital images, each digital image having an image type; providing one or more image-type distributions, each image-type distribution corresponding to a theme and including a distribution of image types related to the theme; using a processor to automatically compare the image types of the digital images in the image collection to the image types in the image-type distribution; using the processor to automatically determine a match between the image types in the image collection and the image types in the image-type distribution; and selecting a group of digital images from the image collection having a distribution of image types specified by the determined matching image-type distribution. The method further includes assembling the digital images in the selected group of images into an image-based product and causing the construction of the image-based product.

The invention claimed is: 
     
       1. A method of making an image-based product, the method comprising:
 comparing, by a processing system, image types of a plurality of digital images to image types of an image-type distribution, wherein the image-type distribution corresponds to a theme and includes a distribution of image types related to the theme; 
 determining, by the processing system, a match between the image types of the plurality of digital images and the image types of the image-type distribution; 
 analyzing, by the processing system, the match to determine image types of the image-type distribution that are missing from the plurality of digital images; 
 communicating, by the processing system, a request for the missing image types; 
 receiving, by the processing system, digital images having the missing image types in response to the request for the missing image types; 
 selecting, by the processing system, a group of digital images from the plurality of digital images and from the received digital images having the missing image types, wherein the group of digital images has a distribution of image types specified by the image-type distribution; and 
 assembling, by the processing system, the group of digital images into an image-based product. 
 
     
     
       2. The method according to  claim 1 , further comprising:
 comparing, by the processing system, the image types of the plurality of digital images to image types in each of a plurality of image-type distributions; 
 determining, by the processing system, a plurality of matches between the image types of the plurality of digital images and the image types for each of the plurality of image-type distributions; 
 comparing, by the processing system, the plurality of matches; and 
 selecting, by the processing system, a best match from the plurality of matches, wherein the best match indicates the image-type distribution of the plurality of image-type distributions having image types that best correspond to the image types of the plurality of digital images. 
 
     
     
       3. The method according to  claim 1 , further comprising:
 comparing the image types of the plurality of digital images to the image types in each of a plurality of image-type distributions; 
 determining a plurality of matches between the image types of the plurality of digital images and the image types for each of the plurality of image-type distributions; and 
 communicating the plurality of matches or themes associated with the respective image-type distributions corresponding to the matches. 
 
     
     
       4. The method according to  claim 3 , further comprising:
 comparing the plurality of matches; 
 ordering the matches of the plurality of matches; and 
 communicating the ordered matches. 
 
     
     
       5. The method according to  claim 3 , further comprising receiving a selection of a match or theme from the communicated plurality of matches or themes. 
     
     
       6. The method according to  claim 1 , further comprising receiving, via a user interface, one or more image-type distributions. 
     
     
       7. The method according to  claim 1 , further comprising analyzing the plurality of digital images to determine one or more themes. 
     
     
       8. The method according to  claim 1 , further comprising providing one or more image-type distributions associated with an image-based product. 
     
     
       9. The method according to  claim 1 , further comprising providing a plurality of image-type distributions associated with one theme. 
     
     
       10. The method according to  claim 1 , wherein the image types of the plurality of digital images include one or more of the types: introduction type, character type, person type, object type, action type, and conclusion type. 
     
     
       11. The method according to  claim 1 , wherein the digital images of the plurality of digital images each have a temporal association, and wherein the image-type distribution includes an image type time order. 
     
     
       12. The method according to  claim 1 , wherein image-type distribution includes a specified distribution of person or character image types. 
     
     
       13. The method according to  claim 1 , wherein an image type of the image types of the image-type distribution includes an identified person type. 
     
     
       14. The method according to  claim 1 , wherein the image product is a photo-book or a photo-collage. 
     
     
       15. The method according to  claim 1 , further comprising analyzing the plurality of digital images to identify themes associated with the plurality of digital images. 
     
     
       16. The method according to  claim 1 , wherein the image-based product comprises an electronic image-based product or a printed image-based product, the method further comprising causing construction of the electronic image-based product or the printed image-based product. 
     
     
       17. The method according to  claim 2 , wherein the selecting the best match comprises:
 determining an image-match metric for each comparison of the plurality of digital images to one of the plurality of image-type distributions; and 
 selecting a highest scoring image-match metric. 
 
     
     
       18. The method according to  claim 17 , wherein the image-match metric comprises at least one of an overall number of digital images having image types matching an image type of the respective image-type distribution or an average percentage match of image types of the plurality of digital images to image types of the respective image-type distribution. 
     
     
       19. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by a computing device, cause the computing device to perform operations comprising:
 comparing image types of a plurality of digital images to image types of an image-type distribution, wherein the image-type distribution corresponds to a theme and includes a distribution of image types related to the theme; 
 determining a match between the image types of the plurality of digital images and the image types of the image-type distribution; 
 analyzing the match to determine image types of the image-type distribution that are missing from the plurality of digital images; 
 communicating a request for the missing image types; 
 receiving digital images having the missing image types in response to the request for the missing image types; 
 selecting a group of digital images from the plurality of digital images and from the received digital images having the missing image types. wherein the group of digital images has a distribution of image types specified by the image-type distribution; and 
 assembling the group of digital images into an image-based product. 
 
     
     
       20. A device comprising:
 a memory configured to store a plurality of digital images and an image-type distribution; 
 a processing system coupled to the memory and configured to:
 compare image types of the plurality of digital images to image types of the image-type distribution, wherein the image-type distribution corresponds to a theme and includes a distribution of image types related to the theme; 
 determine a match between the image types of the plurality of digital images and the image types of the image-type distribution; 
 analyze the match to determine image types of the image-type distribution that are missing from the plurality of digital images; 
 communicate a request for the missing image types; 
 receive digital images having the missing image types in response to the request for the missing image types; 
 select a group of digital images from the plurality of digital images and from the received digital images having the missing image types. wherein the group of digital images has a distribution of image types specified by the image-type distribution; and 
 assemble the group of digital images into an image-based product.